Of Frost Giants and Mewling Quims
by jinglebellsisawesome
Summary: <html><head></head>"Please tell me that I did not spend my whole entire life trying to rid Asgard of Thor's stupidity only to be confined here. On Midgard." "What's a 'Midgard?" "...Are you still following me?" "Um...yep!" "Well can you please stop?" "Sorry, no can do." "And why in Odin's name, can you not?" "Because my teacher said that we should help the less fortunate, so...fudge? It's homemade."</html>
1. Now I Know The Truth

A/N: Well, I actually posted this a while ago (back when I was known as _IAmNumberThirteen_), under the name _Magic_, and I took it down because I couldn't find the time to properly dedicate myself to them but now I think I'm ready to put it up again. Just to clarify, once again, this will _not_ be a romance; this is about a young girl befriending the frost giant we all know and love. So, I hope you enjoy.

Also, this takes place after Loki falls to his apparent 'death' at the end of _Thor_.

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><p>Chapter One: Now I Know The Truth<p>

_After the war we said we'd fight together_  
><em>I guess we thought that's just what humans do<em>  
><em>Letting darkness grow<em>  
><em>As if we need its palette and we need its colour<em>  
><em>But now I've seen it through<em>  
><em>And now I know the truth<em>

~Ellie Goulding, Anything Could Happen

* * *

><p>The blindingly white light was all Loki could see for a moment or two before his senses came back to him and he took in his surroundings.<p>

He was in a rather painful and awkward position stuck upon a tree with a very unnecessary and entirely unwanted tree branch in a place a tree branch really shouldn't be. Loki groaned. _How very typical, I happen to end up in the worst possible scenario again and again._

Loki attempted to move and found that it really wasn't worth the trouble as the branch happened to move itself _right there_. He resisted the urge to swear.

But he did throw a wonderful temper tantrum that happened to disturb some nearby life forms (Loki didn't know which, for he was too busy screaming at the top of his lungs) that probably thought Loki was doing something that didn't need to be observed.

Fortunately, though it didn't like that to Loki at the time, during his wild thrashing around, the tree managed to bend just far enough backwards for him to fall down – _un_fortunately the tree branch seemed dead set on following wherever he went and went down with him, causing Loki no small amount of pain in a rather sensitive area.

Groaning, Loki attempted to sit up but soon found that the wind seemed to knock out of his lungs and soon found it was not worth the risk so he just lay there, eyes closed, blissfully unaware of his current state and where he currently resides.

Although, the throbbing in the-place-he-really-didn't-want-throbbing-to-be must become too throb-worthy to bear and so he ended up pulling the offended stick out from underneath his backside and _other_ area and promptly burnt it to flames in his hand.

Of course, doing this made Loki take in all his surroundings and he couldn't stop the annoyed groan (fuelled with a little pain in there, I imagine) that flew past his lips.

"Midgard," Loki said flatly, too weak to even conjure up some sort of scowl that could paint a perfect picture upon his face that would summon up exactly what he felt at being stuck _here_.

"_Midgard_," Loki again repeated, this time with a bit more success at finding the sneer that positively – Loki was sure – dripped with venom.

He, once again, attempted to sit up and found he was rather successful in this small task. He dusted himself off and stood up – but not before grabbing onto a nearby object as he regained his breath that had been knocked out of him just by standing up.

Suddenly, the object shifted a little and made a small little squeak of pain and Loki, not having been bothered to look at what he had been holding onto before know, screamed out of shock and jumped with a start that somehow made him end up right where he had started: On the floor.

_Midgard_.

Upon closer inspection, Loki noticed that the object was actually a small Midgardian child – a girl, to be exact. Probably about seven or eight years old, Loki concluded.

The little Midgardian scum shrieked and darted away, hiding under a small bush following Loki's outburst. It took a while for Loki's heart to wash away all that excess of adrenaline and managed to get his breath back before, like before, standing up and brushing himself off.

Loki sneered – though he didn't quite know how it would have looked as he was still quite fatigued so it would've probably looked like a grimace more than anything – before walking away…

Only to find that he had a rather large gash on his upper right leg, no doubt originally caused by the infernal tree branch before that thing-that-was-beneath-him (quite literally, I may add) had made him jump and had ripped it open even more. And of course, with the adrenaline disposed of he had no pain relief, further battering an already battered man—no, sorry, _God_.

It was at this time that Loki finally lost it. All his pent up anger over finding out that he was the thing that Asgardian men and women warn their children about, the evil monsters from Hell, all the hurt from Odin – his _father_ – picking Thor, time and time, over and over again – he had even dared to think, dared to _imagine_, that if he had got rid of the Frost Giants (of which he was one) then maybe, just maybe, Odin may come to think of him as a King, the favoured son, for once.

But no, of course not. It was Thor, it was always _Thor_ – never Loki, even though he had done countless other things that his dear brother seemed to take the credit for, Thor was always the best. The good son. Thor would never have to worry about being around ice and snow, never had to pretend to be normal, never have to stand in someone else's shadow, waiting to be appreciated, to be _noticed_.

And so all of this seemed to burst out of Loki and into the polluted air that made up the appalling excuse for one of the nine realms.

Loki screamed and screamed, never thrashing around – he didn't want to cause any further discomfort for his already painful leg.

It seemed to stretch on and on for hours, but in reality was probably only minutes – the universe had a way of making moments seem to carry on for longer than they actually are, Loki had known this for a while but only ever thought it would happen on Asgard, the superior race. But Loki was too preoccupied with allowing all his suppressed emotions out to care about a trifling matter of _details_.

However it all stopped (thank Odin) when the little Midgardian started laughing, a quiet, small sound coming out of her mouth that made Loki almost certain that he had imagined it, but all it took was one glance at the petite girl to see that she was in fact laughing.

_Laughing_. At a God like _him_.

Loki narrowed his eyes at her, making them into little slits that would have frightened any other half-witted ape on this planet except her. If anything it only made her louder.

"Is something funny," Loki started, punctuating every word to make it sound all the more menacing, his voice low and deep – her childish giggles long gone, "little ape?"

He wasn't sure if he were imaging it or not, but he was almost sure that she had gulped, in fear. Of _him_. Loki grinned evilly, a devilish smirk decorating his handsomely good looks. _This is going to be fun…_

"After all," he continued in the same, almost accusing, tone, "we wouldn't want that now, would we?"

The Midgardian seemed to tremble. At first he thought that his plan was actually working and that she was literally cowering in fear of him: Loki; the rightful king of Asgard.

But alas, fate soon decided that would not be the case, as the Midgardian promptly burst into laughter – _how strange_, he mused, _that a creature so small could produce such a big noise_ – annoying Loki to no end.

"I suggest you stop this infernal noise," he all but hissed at her in the hopes that he might scare her away, but to no avail, for the girl still created that loud sound that seemed to ring in and out of his ears, making his head feel all funny.

"_Humans." _He spat out whilst rubbing a hand over his face in the hopes of warding off her insolent weapon.

"Yes, we are," she replied, seemingly oblivious to his hatred over humanity – and even more ignorant over his abhorrence to _her_ – with a small smile still plastered on her face, laughter subsided.

Loki didn't bother replying, for it did not deserve anymore of his attention than he had already given it. He started to walk away.

"Hey! Hey where are you going?" She had to run to keep up with his long, powerful, God-like strides. He didn't reply.

"Hellooooo?" She repeated, this time dragging out the end of the word in such a childlike and pathetic behaviour that Loki had to close his eyes to stop his fantasies of ripping this ape apart, limb by limb.

Nevertheless, she still persisted. Taking to this new form of torture, she endeavoured to wave her hand in front of his face in such a fashion that he almost started to believe that the phrase 'headless chicken' seemed apt to her.

"Anybody in thereeeee?" Of course, as he was extremely tall and she was extremely small, her arm didn't _quite_ manage to reach up to anywhere near his eyesight – but her voice certainly did. She had that tone of voice that was just that right high amount that it seemed to almost screech at him.

Finally he had enough.

He whirled onto her. "Do you have any idea what you are doing?" His voice had taken on a dangerous note, daring her to go against him, but knowing that she wouldn't – no matter how lowly he thought of the Midgardians, he didn't take them to be _that_ stupid.

He was wrong, evidently.

Cocking her head to the side that resembled that of a lost creature begging for food, she looked imploringly at him, making him sigh and rub his hand over his face for the second time.

"Just…never mind," he sighed, too tired to further argue with her. He needed sleep. A _lot_ of sleep. He waved a hand at her, brushing her off. "Just go do whatever it is you Midgardians do." He marched onwards.

"'Midgardians'?" He heard her question, mostly to herself than to him, before she scampered after him, wanting answers to her numerous amounts of questions.

"'Midgardians'?" she repeated, to him this time, with an undeniable question on her face that demanded an answer. "What are 'Midgardians'?"

He inwardly groaned at her never-ending chatter. "Nothing."

"Well they have to be something, otherwise you wouldn't have said it."

"Oh, really?"

She abruptly stopped, hands on hips. It took a couple of moments before he figured she'd stopped and he had no idea in the name of Odin, of what had possessed him to wait for her.

"What?"

She pursed her lips. "Don't mock me," she ordered.

"What?" Loki repeated, this time with a more questionable look on his face than that fatigued glaze.

"You mocked me."

"So?" Not entirely sure why she cared too much.

She walked up to him. "Don't do it again."

Loki, assuming they were going to start walking again, strode on until he heard a cough behind him.

"What?" He said for the third time, with a hint of sarcasm and annoyance etched on his face.

"I said 'don't do it again'," she waited for him to take the hint.

He didn't. "Yes, I know, I heard—" _I think the whole of Midgard heard_, he wanted to add on the end but refrained himself just in time. "—so?"

She scoffed. "'So'?"

"What is it with your incessant need to copy everything I say?"

"What is it with your incessant need to be an ass?"

Loki raised his eyebrows in a peculiar manner, as if he hadn't expected someone as young as her to know this form of vocabulary. Especially considering why it would be an insult.

"The best thing to an insult that you can come up with is: 'Oh, what is your incessant need to be a _donkey_'?"

Unfortunately, this confused the poor girl terribly. "I didn't call you a donkey," she stated slowly, as if fearing for his sanity. "I called you an ass."

"Yes, and that is a donkey, is it not?" Loki sighed, exasperated. _This is why I _hate_ being around lowly life-forms. They don't even understand simple vocabulary._

"What?"

"An ass is a donkey, you insolent creature!" Loki managed to refrain from shouting at her, but only just. He was quite pleased with himself.

The _insolent creature_ bit her lip as one would do if you were in deep concentration, but then seemed to give up as it was too challenging for her, Loki's lip curled up in disgust. "Maybe," she shrugged lightly as if brushing the matter off. "Maybe not, who knows?" She made a clueless arm gesture, almost as if inviting Loki into a private joke.

He didn't get it.

"Everybody knows, you pathetic creature," Loki said, repulsed by her lack of any little brain cell lurking in that wide open space in her head.

Her facial features still showed confusion. "No, no, they don't," she said in disbelief – but as to whether it was intended for him or for her, Loki could not say.

Loki scoffed, feeling animosity by this conversation, "whatever," he stated off-handedly as he turned around and started to walk away from the wretched child. _No doubt probably sent by Heimdall or some other God that wants revenge on me – maybe even the Frost Giants_—Loki was interrupted briefly from his quiet musing by the Midgardian in question on his heels, following him.

"Hey! Don't forget me!"

_Yes,_ Loki brooded. _I can see why they would resort to this form of torture._

"And once again, we are back to _silent moooooode_," Drawing out the words while facing straight ahead, her eyes unseeing. Loki wondered whether she was actually aware of how much idiocy she is producing by the second.

"You do know how absurd you are, don't you?" He asked, genuinely concerned – not for her health, but for his.

This seemed to snap her out of her reverie. "You talk funny," she finally uttered, peering up at him with her nose all crinkled up in disgust. "I don't like it," she said, her voice all full of an obvious dislike for creatures far more advanced than she is.

"Evidently," he said, dryly.

Without any warning, a sharp poke in his lower abdomen, to the right-hand side, caused by a very small – but very spiky – finger nail that showed traces of nail biting on it, adding to the additional discomfort of being poked in the side.

"Ow!"

"Don't get narky with me, mister," she ordered, acting older than her age. "It's not wanted."

"Oh, so, only _you_ can use it then, is that right?" Loki said, traces of sarcasm - …and is that a hint of _playfulness_? – apparent in his tone.

She smirked. "Finally, you've managed to catch on."

Loki had to refrain from banging his head against a nearby tree – _anything_ would have been better than to be stuck with, here of all places, with a clueless and lowly creature such as herself.

"So, what brings you here?" The Midgardian asked, obviously feeling that sentimental trait that all mankind share to ask ridiculous questions in the hopes of building up an equally ridiculous conversation that neither party really wants, nor cares about.

_Maybe if I pretend to seem interested in its pointless discussions that have no meaning to them whatsoever, then maybe _it_ might take the hint and leave me alone_. "Oh, no reason."

She shook her head in disbelief. "_'No reason'_?" she repeated mockingly. Loki narrowed his eyes. She saw this. "What?" She asked, suddenly defensive, "Nobody just seems to wander around these parts – Hell, no one probably even _knows_ these parts – so why are you here?"

His previous tactic shattered, he turned to disregarding.

"Not to mention the fact that I saw, not one, but _two_ temper tantrums back there," she continued, not letting him get away over this, "over being stuck in a high up tree about several metres high in the _sky_! And then you fell and you didn't die. You _did not_ die." She once again shook her head in astonishment at that fact. "So yes, _I have questions_!"

She finished her long rant looking rather red in the face and tired. _Possibly by the fact that she's probably managed to find that missing brain cell and put it to good use, only to find that she's not comfortable with that incredibly small amount of knowledge_, Loki concluded bitterly.

The silence that stretched across the pair seemed…stifling, to say the least. Save for the noise their shoes made across the forest floor, and the other nocturnal animals, the pair pretty much seemed to co-exist in silence.

"…I'm sorry," she finally said – her eyes all full of regret and open honesty. Loki looked down at her, shocked at the truthful expression on her face, eyebrows raised rather high.

"What?" He asked, dumbfounded. "Whatever for?"

"I just… I don't know, I just want to know everything about everyone basically, and I know that sometimes, I can seem rather nosy and acting all harassing. So, I'm saying sorry."

Loki, still not understanding the simple logic behind all this, just nodded his head slowly, trying, for her sake and sanity, to understand but kept failing.

She seemed to think of something, a small smile playing on her face. "You know," she started, "there's an old saying: Curiosity killed the cat…"

"But satisfaction brought it back," Loki finished.

She acted shocked. "You've heard of it?"

Loki nodded. "Of course," He and Thor had both been taught the ways of the Nine Realms and learning about different proverbs and sayings in the Nine Realms. Loki had always been fascinated and had lived for the days when he could learn new knowledge. Thor, obviously, did not.

A wry smile again made its way across her childlike features. "It's one of my favourite sayings."

"_Proverbs_," Loki corrected.

The smile disappeared, only to be replaced by a loud groan emanating from the small creature beside him. _Goodness,_ Loki thought, _I'm surprised my eardrums aren't bleeding!_

"See what I mean?" She said, pointing at him that did nothing to help him gain any insight as to what is going on in that funny little Midgardian brain of hers.

"_Not really_, no," Loki said, earning yet another loud moan of disapproval from the creature beside him. He grinned – he enjoyed messing with this one.

"No one talks like you do anymore."

"Well, there's a simple truth for that," Loki started, looking back and forth as if saying something totally secret that only she could hear, then leaned down so he was to her miniature height and whispered in her ear.

"_That's because you're all pathetic._"

A big shove was his only reply.


	2. Head First

A/N: Thank you so much for all the feedback. I really appreciate it. I hope you enjoy this chapter.

* * *

><p>Chapter Two: Head First<p>

_'Cause I don't know how it gets better than this_  
><em>You take my hand and drag me head first<em>  
><em>Fearless<em>  
><em>And I don't know why but with you I'd dance in a storm in my best dress<em>  
><em>Fearless<em>

~Taylor Swift, Fearless

* * *

><p>The Midgardian and Loki – who, Loki had found out, he was very pleased with himself, was actually called Mitchie – talked and walked for what seemed like hours. Truthfully, they seemed to just drive each other mad, but they liked to think that they had actually made some sort of connection with each other.<p>

"Shut up, Mitchie!"

Well, okay, maybe only Mitchie believed that.

"No, seriously, Loki, where _do_ you come from?"

"A place."

"But that could be _anywhere_!" She said, arms flying up in the air exasperatedly.

"Exactly."

"Why won't you just tell me?" She pleaded.

"No."

"Why?"

Loki started muttering under his breath, something too low for any mortal hearing to comprehend.

"_Why_?"

"Because it does not matter!" He finally shouted at her, losing his patience.

Mitchie blinked for a couple of seconds, as if contemplating that he had actually shouted at her. Loki forced himself to exhale the breath that he had unconsciously been holding.

The pair then found themselves in another rather awkward situation again, with a formidable silence that takes no survivors.

Until Mitchie broke said evil silence.

"Okay," she said, for lack of a better word.

"Okay." Loki repeated, unsure of what else there would be to say. _How do Midgardians recover from something like this? There is nothing quite like this on Asgard_. Thinking of Asgard suddenly made a pang in his chest appear of how his dear brother and father had elected to throw him out.

_But they didn't throw you out, did they, Loki_, that annoying little jab in his mind was saying. _You let go of the stick, it was _your_ fault. No one else's._

Although thinking and believing are too entirely different things.

"Where are you staying now?" Mitchie asked attentively, as if she were afraid of setting him off again. Loki frowned; thinking about how Mitchie was afraid to even _speak_ to him showed that he had all the power in this stand-off – however Loki didn't feel proud.

He felt exhausted.

"Uh, nowhere really." Loki sighed, thinking about the different lists of jobs that he was supposed to do. It originally had just been one: Destroy the Frost Giants, get the throne. But now there were so many that Loki couldn't bother counting.

She bit her lip, seeming to contemplate a difficult decision. Finally, though, she had come to a conclusion.

"Okay, you say you're really good at sneaking, right?" She started off; needing confirmation before doing this potentially rather dangerous thing that could end up going wrong on some many different occasions. Loki nodded, but didn't understand why that would be relevant to what they were just discussing.

"Well, I have a spare room, somewhere, in my house – well, it's not _my_ house, is it, it's my parents' house—" she started babbling that stopped when she cleared her throat in order to get her racing thoughts under control. "Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that you can come stay with me—_us_ – if you would like," she rushed the end rather quickly, as if saving herself from potential embarrassment.

Loki stood, too shocked to even form single words. This girl, this _Midgardian_, was actually offering him somewhere to stay. A _home._ Stability. She showed _compassion_ for _him_. Did she even know what he had done? That he had killed? That he was an outcast?

That he wanted her race dead?

"So," she stuttered, not really knowing what to say. "W-what do you say?"

He was still so silent that Mitchie assumed that she had probably destroyed whatever semi-normal friendship she could have ever hoped to get in her lifetime. "You're right," she laughed nervously. "Who would want to stay with me? Psh, that's ridiculous! Besides, I don't know you and you don't know me and my parents could find out at any minute, there's a whole lot that could go wrong and I—"

"Mitchie," Loki interrupted her incessant chatter, finally finding his voice at last. He flashed her an impish grin. "I'm good with danger."

Her face broke out into a huge grin as she stared up at him, thanking the lucky stars that maybe she might have found a decent friendship with someone. _Even if he __was__ wayyyy older than her…_

"Good, then," she positively beamed at him – she didn't think she could even stop grinning. Even Loki managed to meet her halfway and cracked a small smile for her. She held out her hand.

"Welcome aboard, Loki."

He spat on his hand and clasped it onto a tiny in comparison to his, hand. She looked faintly disgusted.

"What?" He asked defensively.

She shrugged it off but Loki wasn't going to let her go away that easily.

"What?" He repeated in a demanding tone. "You _do_ do this handshake to settle deals, do you not?"

"Uh, no."

"_Ah._"

* * *

><p>"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Let me get this straight. So, basically, you're an <em>actual<em> God… You come from this magical land called _Ass_gard up in the sky and you're a _Prince_…" The stunned girl managed to spit out before having to regain her breath as she decided to make the stupid mistake of saying all that in one go.

They were walking the short distance back to their house and Loki was already having doubts about whether this little Midgardian would be the ideal housemate for him to have.

As if right on cue, the little Midgardian in question was just raising yet _another_ point about his life story.

"Plus, even if you _are_ a Horse God, then why would you be _here_ in the first place? Why not go back to your flying castle?"

_Norse__ God, it is a __Norse__ God…_

Loki sighed – he knew that explaining who and what he is to her would get messy and complicated, and he feared that if she knew what had done that she wouldn't want to know him, and would take extraordinary measures in her daily life just to avoid any further confrontation from him.

Which is why he didn't tell about his short rule over Asgard – or as she liked to say in her basic Midgardian form, _Assgard_ -, nor the fact that he's an evil monster that Asgardian women and men tell their young children about at night. _'Never trust a Frost Giant_', they would say, '_you can never tell when they're planning to __attack__. Jötunn!_

Loki had to forcibly tear his mind away from those stories about _him_ and _his_ race. T_hat you almost destroyed_, that little nagging voice in the back of his head pointed at him. _Thor would've been able to do it, he __would__ have done it. You? All you are is a failure. You are unloved, _Loki Laufeyson.

"…and I'm not entirely certain that I believe you," Mitchie's voice in the background was saying. "I mean, I don't really have anything against you being a…," her voice faltered as she thought of the best way to really describe what Loki _was_ according to the newly found knowledge that she has just acquainted.

"Yes?" Loki prompted, now taking an interest into the conversation – but mostly he just enjoyed being able to annoy her.

"…A being of supernatural powers," she hurried off, almost as if she thought that just saying it out loud would induce a sudden level of crazy into the room. But what she doesn't know yet is that the crazy has already made a home right in her head.

"'_A being of supernatural powers_'?" He quoted, not entirely happy with how it's panned out. Apparently, he is a being of supernatural powers, and Loki doesn't exactly bode well with that. "Is that the best your _high_—" he said the word with an obvious lace of sarcasm present "—level of intelligence can come up with?"

She poked him yet again, a sharp pointy object being thrust into his lower abdomen and Loki had to refrain from rolling his amazing green eyes at her pathetic attempt at bravado.

"Hey! It's not funny!" She said as she saw his trademark smirk back atop its place on his face, but the comment didn't really have any effect on either one of them as she soon started joining in.

Soon, they suddenly found an immense great need to let out all their pent up and repressed emotions by laughing side by side. The trouble was that they didn't know, or care, about what they were laughing about. It's like when you get an irresistible urge that all creatures and life-forms get when they just want to laugh for no apparent reason.

Unfortunately, it seems that a Midgardian and a Jötunn have both fallen prey to their inner laughter.

Thankfully, the onslaught had both ended as quickly as it once came as the happy duo soon found themselves wiping away their excess fluid at the corner of each eye – and some had, rather unfortunately, already broken loose and fell in cascades of water down their smiling faces. One looked at the water and shook his head in disgust and the other just sort of stared at their finger, wondering where on earth that clear, salty liquid had come from.

"Well, we are never doing that again," Loki spat out, disappointed in himself for showing such a great emotion as that upon a creature far beneath him. _Just imagine what the All-Father would have to say_, that overpowering voice in his head rang again, _if he saw just what a disappointment his 'son' really is. No wonder you're adopted!_

"Yeah," Mitchie was saying, still staring at the runny liquid that was currently running down her finger and into the palm of her hand. "It creates a very weird reaction…" Unfortunately she didn't realise just what _sort_ of finger she was holding up right in front of her face.

This time Loki _did_ roll his eyes at her childish and innocent behaviour. "Please, stop staring at your finger like that, it's rather rude."

Mitchie quickly snatched out of her obsession with her own tears and looked down to see just what finger of hers she was holding up. She then grinned when she realised.

"Just for the record," she started, turning off at a right – the directions that would lead them directly back to her home. She turned back to look at him as he followed.

"I was being you."

* * *

><p>When the pair found themselves on the front steps of a very Midgardian looking house, they heard a rather loud groan emanating from the left side. Mitchie sighed, rolling her eyes in the process, while Loki raised his eyebrows and wondered just what on <em>Midgard<em> where they doing in there?

Mitchie just shook her head. "Come on," she beckoned him over to the side where there seemed to be a little gap – about the size of an entrance to a ventilation shaft – that could manage to squeeze the Midgardian through and just _about_ the God.

However it didn't seem like that at the time.

"I can't fit through there," Loki stated, appalled, not only about his size and the way she sorely underestimated him if she seriously thought that he would willingly go through there, but also the fact that it looked rather dirty and Loki refrained from doing anything that might soil his clothing, or his person.

"Oh, don't be such a sour puss," was his only reply as the girl brushed past him and knelt down into the gap. She turned her head slightly to look at him through the corner of her eye. "Well, are you coming or not?"

Loki grumbled under his breath about how unfair it was that he, the unwanted son, was the one who had to crawl inside a dank and dirty, confined space where the only other thing he could use for company was an insignificant little Midgardian.

"Lokiiiiii?" She drew out the last syllable of his name as she started to crawl onwards towards the centre of her house.

"Yes, yes, I'm coming," he snapped at her, wanting nothing more than to be alone with his thoughts. Well, actually, that wasn't strictly true. What he wanted was nothing more than to be King of Asgard – but getting the weak organism out of his sight would just have to do.

They crawled on for a bit more, Mitchie once or twice attempting to engage in conversation to, as she put it, 'lighten the mood', but all it did for Loki was make him fantasize about all the different ways he could kill the mewling creature beneath him.

Gradually, they came to the end of the tunnel-like thing and into the Midgardian house – the place that his dear _friend_, Mitchie, called 'home'.

They sat up and dusted the dirt off of them, well, Loki did; Mitchie just sort of shrugged her shoulders lightly. Loki looked on in disgust.

Out of the blue, a loud groan once again made itself known in the house, though this time it was much louder as they were in the house this time rather than outside. Loki smirked as a second noise – a rather loud bang – followed soon after. Mitchie kept giving glances between him and the direction of the uproars that came unexpectedly and without warning.

Mitchie soon noticed how his smirk quickly turned into a light chuckle as the last and final noise came and went rather…_drawn out_ we shall say, for lack of a better word.

Loki soon noticed her staring at him, a disapproving scowl upon her face. It was a look he had grown all too familiar with.

"What?" He asked innocently.

"You," she said simply, still staring at him, though with slightly more disgust than disapproving.

"That's not a proper answer—"

A loud _click_ sound came next, and it was all too clear that it was not coming from the same place as the previous ones.

"Crap," Mitchie spoke softly before leaping into action and started shoving Loki up the stairs that somehow magically appeared behind him. _Do these mortals know magic, or is it the fact that I have grown too trusting in these last few hours on this cursed Realm?_

"What is going on?" Loki demanded, allowing himself to be shoved – for he could push her off without much force but refrained against it. Whatever provoked Mitchie into action probably meant imminent death or destruction, Loki concluded. Otherwise how would she have stayed so calm when being met with the God of Lies?

"Shh," she hissed at him, still shoving him – _quite hard_, Loki observed closely, _for a Midgardian_.

They reached the top of the stairs when the front door suddenly opened, or at least, Loki assumed that it was the front door, because where else would it be? Loki presumed that nobody else knew the little side entrance that he and Mitchie had used to sneak in; otherwise she wouldn't have looked so paranoid. Plus, the little click came from the front, not the side.

"Mitchie, Demi, Harry – anybody in?" A voice shouted from the bottom floor. Loki noticed that the person speaking was obviously rather drunk as they had spoken with a noticeable slur in their tone. He felt Mitchie tense behind him.

"What's wrong?" Loki asked quietly and hesitantly. He knew what it was like to feel alone and not want to be around people. He didn't want the same fate for her.

When he noticed where his train of thought was heading, he reprimanded himself. _She is a child_, he told himself and kept repeating to himself until he started to believe it, _and a Midgardian at that._

She didn't reply at first, just sort of stood there, slightly in shock, until her mind started to kick and she opened a wooden door to the right of where they were standing. "In here," she mouthed to him, using hand gestures. _Must be a Midgardian tradition_.

He followed her into the open door and, once they were both in, she shut it behind her and placed her back to it, before sliding down into a sitting position by the door.

"What in Odin's name is going on here?" He quietly demanded of her, requiring all the facts before figuring out his next move.

She let out a tired sigh, appearing to not hear him. She looked exhausted – too exhausted in fact that he didn't bother asking any more questions.

They just sort of sat – well, again, Mitchie sat, Loki just sort of stood around, not really knowing what to do. He kept observing the small details of this domicile he would be staying in for the foreseeable future.

For instance, this was obviously Mitchie's room because of the way it is styled and decorated. It is simple and plain – _much like her personality_, he mused – and there was nothing that really stood out.

"You can sit down, you know," the fatigued voice of Mitchie said, though he was much more of a silent whisper or a prayer for him to not go around snooping around in her bedroom.

Loki nodded, not saying anything and sat down on the plush, made up bed that was obviously Mitchie's.

The pair found themselves in a companionable silence that quickly spread when Loki found that she was indeed asleep, her head being propped up on the wall and her body in a rather awkward position that Loki found that he couldn't even look at her because it was _that_ awkward.

However, Loki felt it right to put her back in a better place to rest and walked over to her sleeping form and lifted her up as though she weighed nothing and placed her gently in the bed, tucking the covers up over her. Her body then relaxed against the covers and she turned over onto her side before drifting back off again.

Loki smiled softly, thinking his debt repaid for her letting her stay in her home, and he sat around on a nearby chair and began to plot his next move.


	3. These Ties That Bind

A/N: Once again, thank you so much to all you amazing people who have read/reviewed/favourited/followed this story. I hope you enjoy the next chapter (I apologise for my lateness in advance).

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><p>Chapter Three: These Ties That Bind<p>

_The ties that bind us are sometimes impossible to explain. They connect us even after it seems like the ties should be broken. Some bonds defy distance and time and logic; Because some ties are simply meant to be._

~Grey's Anatomy, Meredith Grey

* * *

><p>It was one of <em>those<em> mornings. You know what I'm talking about, don't you? The kind where the sun is just _too_ bright and the curtains seem to suddenly become transparent so the sunlight just streams through.

Mitchie _hated_ those mornings.

Groaning softly, she tried turning over and hiding her head under the covers in the vain hope that it might block out the sun – and it worked, it did, for a little bit…until an unwanted person decided the best thing to do was to pull the covers off of her altogether.

She moaned really loudly and was about to tell the unasked for human to go and stuff themselves – it's one of her favourite insult, she doesn't like swearing all that much, unless she gets really hacked off, that is – but when she cracked open an eyelid it wasn't who she had expected to see.

"L-Loki?" Mitchie asked through parched lips and an aching throat – she really hoped she wasn't coming down with a cold – but she could still see clearly…minus a little blurry bits around the edges where the sleepy dust has caught on.

"Yes, you stupid girl. You're little magic trick started making a funny noise and I tried to stop it but it persisted so I broke it." He seemed pleased with himself at managing to destroy something that she almost laughed but then realised something.

"Wait, what?" She sat up quickly – not too quickly that spots danced in front of her eyes, but quickly enough that she noticed a slight thump in her temple. _Great. A headache._

"Like I said, I managed to break you—"

She waved him off. "Yes, yes, I know, you've managed to break it – whatever _it _is – and you're very pleased with yourself at accomplishing such a trivial task," his eyes narrowed into little slits that warned her not to carry on her sentence. "_But_, what did you break?"

"_Like I said_," he repeated again, "I dismantled your magic trick."

Mitchie rolled her eyes. Trying to get a straight answer from him, the wandering poet, is like trying to draw blood out of a stone.

_Literally_.

"Yes, but what _is_ my magic trick?"

Loki frowned. _Surely she must know her own magic trick, as she put it there. I must admit, I was surprised at this puny Midgardian knew such a basic form of magic. Maybe we were all wrong and they do manage to have some magic, after all._

"It was that rounded white thing with various different numbers on it," he explained and Mitchie's heart almost died as she knew _exactly_ what he had just destroyed. "I must admit, I didn't expect Midgardians to know magic at all, I had thought they were all clueless, dumb apes – which they, of course, compared to me, but…" Loki's voice trailed off as he noticed that she stumbled slightly to get out of bed, still in the clothes she wore last night and he the same, to a wooden drawer.

"What are you doing?" Loki asked, genuinely curious.

She didn't answer, just kept trying to find something apparently important in a wooden drawing, talking to herself.

"I said: _What are you doing_?" Loki made sure to pronounce all his words crystal clear so that her poorly underrated mind can have a chance to digest what is being said. _Let's just hope that the bad Midgardian mind doesn't rub off on me._

Again, she didn't answer for a couple of seconds until Loki huffed a little and _that_ seemed to get her attention. However, she didn't berate him for huffing at her, as he expected, she just asked him how long ago he destroyed her 'magic trick'.

"About half an hour ago, why?" Loki, again, seemed confused as to why this would have been important. Mitchie groaned rather loudly and there was a loud tap at the door.

Loki, thinking nothing of it, went to go and open the door but was quickly hushed by Mitchie rather hurriedly. "Don't do that," she hissed at him before starting to search for something that seemed to be rather important by the speed at which she was going.

"What on _Midgard_ are you doing?" He asked her, a quizzical expression on his face – obviously awaiting an answer.

Which, of course, he didn't get.

A second tap then followed on Mitchie's rather wooden door followed closely by a loud-mouthed voice – which, Loki judged, guessing by the tone of voice, was an older girl's, not yet a lady's – which seemed to boom down upon them both, startling Loki and making Mitchie jump.

"Oi, Mitch," the voice demanded. "Mom and Dad are waiting in the car and you know they don't like to be kept waiting!"

Mitchie groaned quietly so that only Loki could hear her, "You mean, _you_ don't like to be kept waiting," her young voice dryly stated.

There was a pause on the other side. "Just hurry up, you idiot!" was the last they heard of their unexpected guest, hearing the retreating footsteps get quieter and quieter until they disappeared entirely.

Loki, as expected, just kept the same facial features on his face all through the entire conversation – and you can only imagine that when he spoke the same attitude kind of slipped into his voice. "_What_ was _that_?" He asked plainly, eyebrows raised and his face showed a mixture of emotions. The main one, unmistakably, was humour.

Mitchie, at first, only sighed and rubbed a weary hand across her forehead. "Demi."

"A… a _demigod_?" Loki was beyond amazed at this. Had there been more of him in history, more people from Asgard who had been misunderstood and feared and hated? Maybe they could help him regain the throne. _But that's almost too good to be true…_

She looked at him with a tired haze in her eyes, but a recognizable look of question. "What? _No_. My sister, her name is Demi." With those words Loki's euphoric moment suddenly burst into flames. _Or maybe into __ice__,_ that persistent voice stated cruelly.

"Ah," He couldn't hide the disappoint in his voice and facial expressions but Mitchie didn't seem all that bothered as she soon went back to opening wooden objects, and upon closer inspection it was revealed to be a clothes drawer.

His theory was proved correct when Mitchie started flinging random bits of clothes everywhere.

"What is—" a sock flew past him, "going on—" he narrowly dodged a flying cardigan, "_in here_?" Loki demanded, ducking every so often to avoid any form of confrontation between him and clothing.

_I hate Midgard and its inept inhabitants._

Mitchie finally looked up, holding an outfit out to him imploringly. He was mystified. "Does this look okay to you?" She asked him, not actually looking at him, but instead at the rather…_colourful_, shall we say, ensemble.

He raised his eyebrows. "You're seriously asking _my_ opinion?"

She shrugged. "Just thought you might like to let off some steam and mock my choice of clothing—" she paused for a couple of seconds, waiting to see whether he might have taken the hint and decide to mock ridicule her clothing style. "Nothing from you," she finally stated, "okay, well, I'm just going to go back out through this door to quickly get changed—" she pointed to another wooden door just behind her that had been painted white with butterflies on the top "—in that room there. And, I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm trusting you in my room for a couple of minutes – so _don't break anything_!" She left quickly after that, not even bothering to put up with an answer, which was probably for the best considering what Loki was going to say to her.

He heard the tell-tale sound of a lock clicking in place so he gathered that she must have locked him in him. He sighed. _What's the point of saying that you trust me if you go and lock me in anyway?_

Not wanting to stay standing in the position he had been for the most part of the morning – not at night, obviously, he had sat down in a nearby chair and read through a couple of her story books to see whether they had heard any rumour about Frost Giants, and he was so glad when he found that there wasn't. He didn't think he could handle it if Mitchie or someone else thought him only a monster.

Realising where he was going with this sentiment, he narrowed his eyes and lectured himself about the merits of emotions and how _not_ to get too emotionally involved – emotionally _caring_ – about anyone, _especially _about such a creature that is so far beneath him.

Once that had been drilled enough times into his head, he decided to bend the truth a _little_ – I mean, come on, he _is_ the God of Lies – and start snooping through some of her stuff.

He stumbled across what looked to be a family portrait of her, her sister – _the pretend demigod_, Loki smirked evilly -, what appeared to be an older brother and her two parents.

However, it wasn't long until Loki noticed there was something wrong with this picture.

It was the way she was smiling – it wasn't a happy one, wasn't an _oh-aren't-I-so-lucky-that-I-have-been-born-into-this-family_ smile. No, it was a fake one, of all the people in that photograph, Mitchie was the only one that seemed to look out of place, and it almost made Loki cringe to even look at it.

He was all too familiar with that smile.

_What's that Midgardian saying?_ He wondered to himself, _'It takes one to know one'._

Just then, the lock clicked once and Loki had to hurriedly place the photograph back into the little drawer of which he had found it in. _For the love of Odin, how many wooden objects does this Midgardian have?_

Mitchie stepped out in that rather illuminating outfit of hers, eyes twinkling mischievously at him – daring him to mock her. '_See what would happen to you if you do'_, they seemed to whisper to him, try and entice him in.

"Wow," Loki said, actually too stunned to form proper words. _For the love of… Does this Midgardian have no sense of honour or dignity?_ Loki mentally asked himself, disgusted beyond words – and reason – by her lack of decency.

"I'll take that as '_That is the most disgusting thing I have ever seen'_," she attempted to imitate his British accent – but failed miserably.

"You sound…almost _pleased_ with my repulsion at your lack of decency," Loki found it hard to even _look_ at her, not just because of her dress style but also because she decided to choose every possibly colour she could.

She smirked smugly, "Why, yes," she stated, rather pleased with herself. "People tend to shape you into a certain character – so by doing this helps break said evil character," she explained – however Loki still needed help understanding what was going on in that funny little Midgardian head of hers.

"Say again?"

She sighed rather loudly. "In our society, people tend to make you out to be someone different than you are, and they won't care about stepping on other people's feelings to do it, especially at school and—"

"What is this 'school'?" Loki demanded his attention had quickly shifted from trying to figure out the little puzzle that made up Midgardians, into this new found word: _School_.

"_Wait_, you don't know what school is?" Mitchie sounded shocked – she had never ever encountered anyone who had never _ever_ heard of school.

Loki shook his head, not really understanding her outburst and her question.

She put her hands to her head, "So, you, like, have never been to a school—" she started to ask but then changed it halfway through the last word, "Of course, you're a magical prince in a magical land called Assgard," she muttered, generally to herself.

"Asgard," Loki corrected somewhat bitterly – the Midgardian was already getting on his nerves and this was, technically, his first day here.

However she didn't seem to think too much of it, she just simply waved a hand impatiently before clarifying that he doesn't know anything about school, to which Loki shook his head. _Again_.

"Okay, well school is basically where kids aged four learn about random – mainly boring – stuff, which is basically torture, in the name of education. Need I say more?" Mitchie seemed rushed of her feet as she kept coming across the little things that must have been helpful in this torture called 'Education'.

"So you get tortured…" Loki started, feeling as if he might have gotten the hang of it – however not so good that he didn't miss Mitchie suppressing her childish giggles, which could obviously have meant that he had got it wrong.

"You lied to me," Loki narrowed his eyes at her, his already deep sounding tone sounding even darker and scarier.

"No," Mitchie said, his tone affecting her, which was the plan, "I just really have to go," she started running off down the stairs, Loki dashing rather madly to try and catch up with her.

"And just where are you going?" Loki demanded, firmly standing before her and the door.

"To school," She feigned going right and then manoeuvred to the left. Unfortunately for her, Loki had years of experience behind him, she did not.

"The place where you get tortured?" Loki asked sarcastically and this time Mitchie _did_ laugh.

"Yes, Loki, to the place where I get tortured, are you happy now?"

Loki sighed and allowed her to move past him – but not before stating plainly what in the name of Odin he was supposed to do. She just answered vaguely to not break anything, and she also said goodbye and that she would be back in five minutes, which Loki suspected was a lie but didn't bother saying anything.

After the door shut behind her he could faintly hear the sound of her young voice calling to her family that she was coming and that she was sorry she was so late, making up some nonsensical story to go with it. Loki almost rolled his eyes, even though it would have been no use as she wasn't even here to berate him.

Loki smirked softly at that thought, but then that smirk quickly wiped off his face as this new found feeling he had just discovered. He narrowed his eyes again, ready to admonish himself, but he couldn't find any sort of energy left to do that.

So he grudgingly went back upstairs to Mitchie's room contemplating getting some well-earned – and well needed – rest, blaming his sentimental reproach on lack of sleep.


	4. Where the Vampires Feast

A/N: Thanks for the reviews/favourites/follows. They really help me and I am grateful for them. I hope you enjoy this chapter. Also, I know that Halloween was ages ago and that this chapter is _very_ overdue so I apologise sincerely. However, I hope that this makes up for it...

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><p>Chapter Four: Where the Vampires Feast<p>

_From my laboratory in the castle east_  
><em>To the master bedroom where the vampires feast<em>  
><em>The ghouls all came from their humble abodes<em>  
><em>To get a jolt from my electrodes<em>

~Bobby Pickett, Monster Mash

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><p>Several weeks passed by since that fateful day when Loki mysteriously fell from the sky. The Midgardian and Loki had entered a comfortable routine which involved Loki hiding out in her <em>tiny<em> wardrobe whenever one of her family members came up to her room for a "talk". She had also managed to devise a very clever, if he does say so himself, way of collecting some 'human' food; something she called poptarts. Loki refused to admit that it was good.

In the past few days, though, Loki found out a lot about this little girl he had somehow managed to befriend and her less-than-normal family. He knew that she had an older sister called Demi (_which didn't stand for_ Demigod...), her parents both were teachers who worked at different schools to the one Mitchie frequents, her age was eight-and-a-half and the year they lived in was 2005, in some area they call _America_.

It appeared as though he had been sent back in time from when he and Thor were last occupying Midgard, judging by the lack of exclamations and any reports about what had happened. It was almost a shame; he would have enjoyed seeing Mitchie's reaction to the Destroyer. Maybe then she would start becoming more weary around him.

Mitchie had insisted that she use her personal bank account that, miraculously, managed to buy him some normal _human_ clothes to make him blend in more with society. The first time Mitchie gifted him with a blue T-shirt bearing the title; "_Join the Dark Side. We have cookies_," he attempted to have it burned to the ground where it would rot for all eternity - however Mitchie threatened to throw him out 'on his ass', as she so eloquently put it, that he reigned in his strong hatred. But he still didn't wear it.

However, today, he was manhandled and threatened with permanent castration (_how does someone so young have any comprehension of that term_?) if he refused to wear the T-shirt as all the others were in the wash under the guise of belonging to Mitchie's Father and she declined to borrow one of her Father's 'terrible, dirty excuses of clothing'.

So that was how he found himself; sitting in Mitchie's tiny armchair that barely held his weight, with the Midgardian form of delivering mail; the newspaper. He glanced at the black-and-white lettering that displayed the title and he grinned: _"**BODY DISCOVERED IN UNDERGROUND LAKE**"_, Loki mused, _sounds like my sort of thing_.**  
><strong>

Just as he was about to start reading, the insufferable Midgardian came running in, banging open her bedroom door with all the strength her juvenile body offered her.

"Hey, Loki! _Loki_! Guess what day it is!" The young girl in question proclaimed with a sing-song like tone, her eyes positively merry with excitement and a look normally associated with the Norse God: Mischief.

"Whatever it is, I don't want to know."

Mitchie stuck her bottom lip out in a noticeable pout. "Oh, come on, Loki. For me. _Pleaseeeeee_-"_  
><em>

"For the last time, you pathetic Midgardian, my answer is no."

The 'pathetic Midgardian' in question paused, placing her fingers on her chin as she was lost in thought. "You know, you need to think of some new insults. Those are getting old."

Loki looked as though she had physically wounded him. He furrowed his brows and narrowed his eyes sinisterly. "_What_ _did you just say_?" He tried desperately hard to ignore the growing smirk etching onto her face.

"You're insults are boring. You need new ones."

"You are hardly one to talk," he scoffed.

Mitchie looked thoughtful for a moment before nodding. "I agree with you."

Loki resisted the urge to "facepalm", as the Midgardians dubbed it.

"_Any_way, Loki. Guess what today is!"

He let out an exasperated sigh. "No. But I have the feeling you will enlighten me anyway."

There was a slight pause as Mitchie frowned, trying to decipher his strange words. "Okay, well, today is... the 31st October!" The girl clapped her hands in excitement but paused when Loki raised a single brow. "Hey, you put that one eyebrow down! You know I've always wanted to do that!" When Loki placed his eyebrow back where it belonged, she continued, "And d'you know what that means...?"

"If I answer will you shut up?"

She ignored him. "It's Halloween!" Her brown orbs where dancing with anticipation of this obvious festive holiday. "And Mom says I can dress up as a witch this year so-"

"That's it. You can stop talking now." Loki returned his gaze to the newspaper he was trying to read before _she_ blundered in like the stupid ape she was.

As expected, the Midgardian's jaw promptly dropped to the floor at Loki's blatant dismissal of her favourite festive holiday. "You've never heard of Halloween?" she whispered in shocked disbelief.

Loki sighed once again. He didn't understand how this little Midgardian could keep on annoying him the way she does. _Although_, he mused, _she probably does it for enjoyment.__  
><em>

"No. I don't," Loki snapped as Mitchie snatched away his newspaper when he refused to answer. "And give me that back!"

"It's upside-down, you ninny," Mitchie retorted. "Plus why would you even want to read something that's so full of death and gloom?"

He quickly seized the requested item back from her tiny, ineffectual fists with a sneer. "Maybe I like it. Maybe it gives me some good tips on how to commit a murder."

Mitchie scoffed and crossed her arms but played along anyway. The eight-and-a-half year old was more than used to the God of Mischief's dark humour. "And who would be your first victim?"

"_You._"

"Oh, har har, very funny," she sneered.

"_Nobody's laughing_."

She shook her head to clear her thoughts. "Okay, shut up. We were talking about your inability to comprehend a simple, Midgardian festivity that someone of your stature should understand perfectly."

Loki groaned and fisted his hands painfully in his hair as he fought to keep his temper under control. "Then please, enlighten me."

Mitchie let out a wicked grin. _Victory is sweet._

"Halloween is when everyone dresses up in scary costumes - like a skeleton or an evil witch like Mom says I can be this year - and you go around and knock on people's doors and say, 'Trick or Treat!'. Most of the time they will be nice people and give you some candy but once, me and Demi knocked on this dirty, small home and the people there told us a very rude word for going away."

"Hm. Seems reasonable enough seeing as you did knock on their doors expecting food like some lowlife beggar."

Mitchie stuck her tongue out at him. "But it didn't matter that we didn't get any candies that year because the day after, me and Demi decided to plot our revenge and pelt their house with rotten eggs." She grinned mischievously.

Loki fought the urge to chuckle at this little Midgardian's nerve to go around and do something like that. It reminded him a lot of himself when he was her age; playing pranks on people and thoroughly enjoying every minute of it. Not that Loki would ever dare admit that to the young girl standing in front of him.

So, naturally, he opted for the insult. "You do realise that proper grammar would dictate that you are virtually inept."

The face on Mitchie was priceless. "Say what?"

"It is not '_me and Demi_' - it would be _'Demi and I'_."

There was a pregnant pause. "You know, you're kind of an ass."

Loki smirked slightly as he turned his gaze back on his newspaper. "Again with the donkeys. What did the donkeys ever do to you?"

"...I hate you."

There was a sharp knock on the door. After spending the past few weeks in Mitchie's tiny room, he had learned the different knockings of the Mitchie's family members. This time the knock was, as it was so often before, Demi's.

"Mitch! Where are you? Mom wants you downstairs so she can start your makeup."

"Yeah, okay. I'll just get changed." Mitchie said back before the padded footsteps started to wane before disappearing altogether back where they came from.

Loki raised his left eyebrow. "I assumed that Halloween would be during the evening. Why are you getting changed and putting your makeup on now?"

"It's like a family tradition," she explained. Her voice was muffled slightly by her face being pressed up against her mountain of clothes staked untidily in her closet. "We do this every year. Mom does our makeup dead early so we have time to relax before heading out at seven for some candies."

"Yes, I didn't ask for your family history."

"Alright, snippy," Mitchie smirked as she spied her witch costume. "Not that you'll be complaining any time soon."

Loki took his steaming hot cup of coffee that he made earlier. "And, pray tell, what is that supposed to mean?"

"It means you'll be coming with us."

Loki choked on his drink. "_What_?"

Seeing his expression, she added, "Oh, don't worry. I already sorted out an outfit for you: you'll be a zombie!" She grinned.

Loki was still in some horrible form of shell-shock.

She sighed as she gathered her clothing and made to go into the bathroom. "Come on, Loki. What's the worst that could happen?"

* * *

><p>"Everything," she admitted quietly. "Should have said 'everything'."<p>

"_You don't say."_

Mitchie glanced over at the Norse God and promptly burst out laughing. The egg platter was mounted all down the right side of his face and was already stinking.

She held her arm up to her nose to stop the staunch of the smell into her nose. "God, Loki you stink!"

Loki crossed his arms in annoyance. "And whose fault is that?"

"Well, it's not mine if that's what you're insin- in sin of- no, insinu...ating?"

"_Insinuating_," he finally snapped.

She clicked her fingers. "Yeah, that one." There was a brief pause. "So, if you're..._that word_ that it was me that made us get pelted with rotten eggs and other disgusting things," she shivered, "then you're clearly suffering from brain damage."

"Suffering from brain– _You insufferable vermin_!"

She paused for a second. "You know," she answered thoughtfully, "I don't think I've ever had that one either."

"..._What_?"

"Your insult. Never had that one before."

Loki made a move to further question her priorities when he felt a little thump whack him on the left side. He didn't have to look down to tell that they had been caught.

Mitchie's face was set in prime panic, "Quick! Run!" she yelled as Loki grabbed her slender wrist to stop her from falling behind with her stodgy legs.

"Go faster!" she ordered.

"What do you think I'm doing?" he shot back through gritted teeth.

Mitchie yelled as the onslaught of eggs, carrots and other disgusting rotten foods were thrown at their retreating behinds.

They managed to make it back to the house with no sign of the egg-throwers.

"Thank God," she breathed when Loki placed her back down on her feet.

Loki, however, was rubbing his achingly sore back tenderly. "Right," he answered dryly.

"Hey, Mitchie, is that you?"

Mitchie and Loki both looked at each for a few seconds before the Asgardian-_Frost Giant_, quickly snapped into action. "You go through your door," he told her, "and I'll go through the small thing."

"It's called a ventilation...something," she muttered under her breathe. Either the Norse deity hadn't heard her or was _pretending_ to not here her, judging by the lack of a witty comeback.

Mitchie sighed deeply and counted to ten before opening the door to her home. "Hi, Mom. I'm home."

As expected, her mother (a rather frivolous woman) came to the young girl and bundled her into a big hug. "Oh, sweetie. What took you so long? Demi's been back for ages."

_Yeah. That's because she ditched us for her "new friends._" Well, I was just making sure to go round _all_ of the houses," she finally answered, with the emphasis directed at her annoying older sister.

"Hey! What's the first rule in this household?" Mitchie's Dad suddenly appeared in the hallway. He raised his one eyebrow (_hey, kinda like Loki_) at her sternly.

Mitchie rolled her eyes as her and Demi both answered in monotone, "No fighting with each other."

That seemed to reassure her Dad. He gave a small smile and responded with a simple, "Good," and wandered back out of the room. Her and Demi both looked at each for a moment before her Mom gave them both a big hug.

"Go," she said to Mitchie, her eyes twinkling. "I know you're not blessed by the Goddess of Socialising–"

"_I'll say_," Demi 'coughed'. Mitchie only glared at her.

"–so go back up to your room with your bag of sweets." Her Mom laughed slightly as Mitchie all but ran out of the room and hurtled up the stairs. "But don't eat them all at once!"

"It took you long enough," Loki said as soon as Mitchie opened her room door. He licked his finger before turning the page on the newspaper he was reading before the Halloween evening. Mitchie was glad to see that, unlike earlier, the God had figured out how to read the normal way around.

"I see _someone_ managed to find out the right way up to read."

Mitchie dodged the newspaper as it was hurtled towards her. "Too slow," she teased.

"Well, then you won't want any of the food I 'managed' to steal," Loki's eyes twinkled with mischief.

The Midgardian's eyes widened. "You did? Great!"

"I also managed to steal some of the eggs from those annoying Midgardian's stalking us," he added.

Mitchie soon shared the same mischievousness that occupied the Norse God. "Good. Come on, let's go give them a piece of our minds!"

She made a move to head to the door but stopped abruptly when she ceased to hear the man's footsteps. She turned back around. "Well...are you coming?"

Loki shook his head and pointed to time on her new grandfather clock (she had to beg for a new clock after Loki _broke_ her alarm. _Stupid Horse Gods..._). "It's almost ten. There is no way we're going back outside now."

She followed the man's gaze and was shocked to find that it was indeed ten o'clock in the evening. Man, she and Loki must have been trick or treating for quite the while.

"Okay," she relented, but soon a smirk blossomed beautifully on her young face. "But first, you're gonna have to give me a sweet."


	5. For The Rest of Our Lives

A/N: Thank you so much for all your lovely reviews. They are really kind and probably far more than I deserve ;) Now, I have a slight confession to make, I'm not entirely familiar with the American tradition of Thanksgiving (that's British life for you) and so I have gotten all my information from Wikipedia and early episodes of Grey's Anatomy. This is more fluffy and is something of a filler chapter but I sincerely hope y'all like this.

Oh, and Happy Thanksgiving everyone! Even though it was three days ago, but still. Happy Black Friday...but that was two days ago and Boring Saturday was yesterday. Happy Normal Sunday!

* * *

><p>Chapter Five: For The Rest of Our Lives<p>

_In the moment we're ten feet tall_  
><em>And how you told me after it all<em>  
><em>We'd remember tonight<em>  
><em>For the rest of our lives<em>

~ Birdy, Wings

* * *

><p>Loki was in danger. Actual mortal (<em>excuse the hideous terminology<em>) danger. He was currently hiding out in Mitchie's small, dark, closet with..._  
><em>

_...I think I felt a rat._

He was beginning to feel claustrophobic. Back on Asgard, he had one of the biggest rooms in his house packed tightly with what Midgardians would call an 'ensuite', and his own kitchen should he ever feel hungry.

But because Midgard was one of the worst excuses for a Realm (you could fit a thousand Midgards in Asgard and the quantity still wouldn't dare compete), Loki had to 'make do' – a Midgardian term he had stolen from Mitchie – with his hostess' room. Though that wasn't the problem; her tiny, petty, inconsequential _closet_ was.

The thing barely even gave the God enough room to crouch down, let alone stand up. He was practically laying down, for Odin's sake. And it was all because of that pathetic, stupid, worthless–

_Sock_.

"Oh, Loki. Where are you?"

The tell-tale sign song of Mitchie's voice brought back all of the Norse God's feelings of fear and deep, stomach-churning pain.

_Just keep calm_, he ordered himself as he felt his breathing start to intensify. _Besides, what's the worst that could happen?_

The closet door was flung open to reveal the young female herself harbouring a wicked grin. Her brown eyes were unusually livid with mischief, daring him to try and make an escape. In all of Loki's life, he wasn't certain if anything he'd ever had the misfortune of experiencing came close to the startling amount of fear he possessed in that moment in time.

The Norse God visibly gulped. He saw Mitchie's smirk widen in response to his apparent discomfort.

"Loki," she sang, "looks like I've found you..."

_And in a rather awkward position, may I add,_ he half-expected her to say but she didn't. Maybe he was over-estimating his enemy a bit too much.

He unceremoniously attempted to extract himself from the Midgardian's poor excuse for a closet but as soon as he placed one foot over the threshold he was attacked by Mitchie's sock poking him in his abdomen, due to their height differences. He fell backwards as he ushered a laugh from sudden intrusion on to one of his more sensitive areas. _Hmm. Now it appears as if I have under-estimated my enemy. Looks like I'm going to have to be extra cautious if I want to survive this ordeal._

"Mitchie. What beautiful weather we're experiencing this morning, wouldn't you agree?" he said. He'd heard many of the other mortals use this as a way of garnering 'small talk' and he made the assumption that something like that could be applied for this occasion.

She frowned. "It's raining."

_Great. Well, that didn't work. Now what?  
><em>

An idea came to Loki then and he tried his damnest not to give anything away. "Hey, Midgardian," he called.

The 'Midgardian' in questioned cocked her head. "Hey, Horse God from your magical flying land also known as _Ass_gard. How may I serve you?" she finished in a poor attempt at his accent.

Loki's gritted his teeth at the stubborn mortal's nickname for him and his Realm. However, he chose to ignore the damage done to his pride and instead focused on his devilish plan. "Turn around."

"...Do I look stupid?"

Loki smirked. "You dress sense is appaling; you think saying the colloquial term for a donkey makes you sound smarter; you consistently argue with your sister - no, don't deny it. I can hear you from all the way up here. And when was the last time you cleaned out your closet because it's full of rats."

At that exact moment, a small squeak alerted a nearby presence besides Loki's leg. He picked it up by the tip of its tail, trying not to cringe as he did so, and flung it straight at the partially-stunned human female in the room.

It seemed to do the trick. As expected, Mitchie barked out a _very _high-pitched squeal. Loki was concerned that her parents would come up any minute and barge into the room. She used the sock-covered hand to swat the vermin away as she jumped up on her small wooden chair that barely even supported her own weight, let alone anyone else's. Loki let out a chuckle at the sight before him before he finally crossed the threshold from the vermin-infested closet and into the small room.

"Ew! Get it off! Loki, get it off!" she shrieked, flailing her arms around and slapping her body for any signs of rodents vigorously.

He cupped a slender hand against his ear. "What was that? I didn't quite catch that?"

"Loki! Help me!"

"...nope. Still not hearing anything. Can you please repeat that for me, please?"

He was sure that if she wasn't preoccupied then she would be shooting him a deathly glare that could strike her into Odin's eyes himself. "Loki, I'm sorry for teasing you and tickling you. I promise never to do it again. Now, can you _get this bloody thing off of me?_"_  
><em>

"That's better." He crossed over to where the struggling Midgardian was and picked up the offending rodent. "Goodbye, you insufferable vermin," he said before he opened Mitchie's window and flung it out into the open air.

He turned around. Mitchie was there, trying to catch her breath from all the excitement. As expected, she gave him her award-winning stare. "I hate you," she said simply, however, the statement was deflated slightly from her shallow breathing.

"Whatever you say, young one. Whatever you say."

She tilted her head thoughtfully as she tried to regulate her breathing. "You know, you sound like Yoda when you say that."

Loki raised his eyebrow. "Who and what is a 'Yoda'?"

Mitchie's eyes widened in disbelief. "You've never heard of the Great and Wise Jedi Master?" she mock-whispered.

"This reminds me of what happened on October 31st and, needless to say, I don't want to know anymore."

"Hey! We both agreed that that wasn't solely my fault. After all, you were the attending adult in my vicinity so its safe to say that _you_ must assume responsibility for _your_ actions."

"No, you said that and then stole all of my food."

She smirked. "You should take better care of what is yours."

He shrugged. "Or maybe you should learn to just stick to what is _yours_." When she made a move to retort, he quickly covered her mouth with his hand. "And if you try to argue, you will find out exactly why they call me the God of Mischief."

She bit his hand. He pulled away with a sharp intake. "Last time I read Horse mythology–"

"_Norse_ mythology," Loki interjected dryly. He was more than used to the mortal's blatant disrespect of other Realms and cultures. And she said that _he_ needed new insults. _Ha!_

"–Horse mythology, it said that you were the God of Mischief _and _Lies so, for all I know, you could be lying by even saying that you _are_ a God."

Loki stared at her incredulously. "You are, without a doubt, the weirdest being I have ever had the misfortune to know."

Mitchie beamed as if he had just told her that she won a million dollars. "Thank you."

"No, that wasn't meant as a compliment, you fool," he hissed. "And can you please take that sock off of your wrist, you look ridiculous."

She stuck her tongue out at him but complied, somewhat grudgingly. When the sock was removed from the Midgardian's skin, she turned around to place it back into her drawer, but not before calling out, "You know, you really should learn to handle a tickle fight. You act like a stupid baby."

Loki froze. _That was a fight? Impossible_. The only fights he knew of were the ones back home, on Asgard, where he fought side-by-side against Thor and his three stalkers who were, regrettably, quite good at holding their own on battle. The thing between him and Mitchie wasn't a fight, it was...he didn't even know what it was.

"That wasn't a fight," he said after a pause. He didn't miss the sarcastic look Mitchie threw at him.

"No, Loki, it wasn't an actual fight," she said slowly, pronouncing every syllable. "It was a play-fight."

Loki gave his trademark scowl. Lines started to appear around his lips. "Yes, I'm not you. I do understand Midgardian language."

"Well, clearly you don't if you don't even know what a tickle fight is," she finished with a small laugh at his expense.

Loki didn't respond and instead chose to bore holes into the back of Mitchie's skull, behind all of the brown clumps of hair attached to her scalp.

Mitchie rolled her eyes as she turned around to face the God opposite her. "You know, you're so predictable that its not even funny."

Loki frowned at what she was insinuating. "Just what is that supposed to mean?" he questioned, eyes narrowing suspiciously, although the young Midgardian was more than used to his tone of voice and actually found it quite entertaining.

Exactly why he had no idea.

"It means that everything you do is dull, repetitious and extremely dull."

He smirked. "Bit like you then. How long exactly did it take you to find out what those words meant?" Her uncharacteristic silence gave him the answer he needed. "I thought so."

"...shut up."

Loki raised an eyebrow at her overused insult for him but before he could do so, there was a sharp rap at the door. Mitchie and Loki both locked eyes with each other, giving each other the confirmation to go about their secret operation.

Loki crawled under Mitchie's dank, dirty bed, pinching his nose to stop himself from sneezing from the bad odour her bed omitted. He made sure to tuck all of his limbs in as her bed was rather small and it wouldn't do to have an accidental leg popping out from the end of it.

Once she was sure that the God was in the clear, Mitchie crossed the small distance to her door and opened it slightly, peeping through to see who it was. "Yes?" she questioned as she peaked through the opening.

"Oh, Mitchie dear, you can let me in, you know. I'm not going to hurt you."

Mitchie hesitated a bit, glancing over at her bed where she knew her sort-of friend was laying underneath before widening the door further, allowing her Mother to worm her way into her small room.

Her Mother's nose twitched at the powerful stench her room was projecting. "Oh, Mitchie, when was the last time you opened the window?"

Even though he was temporarily blinded from a couple of centimetres up, Loki could envision the eye roll she would be doing right at that moment and he fought to stop from snickering. Once he realised that he was beginning to get..._used_ to this little routine so much so that he could practically see without seeing what the little Midgardian was doing, he stopped himself short. He was becoming far too attached to someone below his station; it couldn't do to have him even socialising with someone from this Realm. What had become of him? He was becoming like Thor– overly involved with a female of this place.

_Although_, Loki mused dryly. _At least I'm not romantically involved with one of them. That would be a bit worrying if I was – and not just because of the noticeable age difference._

It wasn't until he felt a small tap on his ankle that Loki realised that they were in the clear. He extracted himself (with great effort) from Mitchie's bed and stood up slowly, stretching out his muscles like a prowling tiger. "What was that about?" he asked mid-stretch.

He didn't miss the way Mitchie's eyes lit up like the Fourth of July – he was very proud of himself for knowing what that day meant in Midgardian culture. "Are you feeling thankful today, God of Mischief and Lies? And do be warned that if you _do_ lie, I will castrate you."

Loki stared at her in shock for a moment at the mere mention of that word coming out of the small girl's mouth. "I do not want to know where you have heard that term from."

That caused Mitchie to frown herself. "I don't know, either." A moment passed by before, "Hey! You still haven't answered my question!"

"And, pray tell, what was it again? I can't quite seem to remember. I tend to ignore you when you start talking."

He chuckled as he saw her bottom lip pout but, as requested, she repeated her question, however he cut her off when she got to the bit about castration.

He was shocked to find that he was actually _pondering _her question. He didn't actually know whether there was anything left to be thankful of; what with trying to win over his Father and only to find that his Father tossed him aside thus being the sole reason of his being here, thankfulness wasn't an emotion Loki was familiar with.

He cocked his head to the side as he tried to study her motives. Was she trying to unnerve him? Trying to pry into his deep, dark secrets? His eyes darkened at the thought. Was he being played a fool after all this time?

Evidently, Mitchie must have felt his sudden shift in attitude as her expression changed to one of sadness and regret. "Oh no, Loki, I wasn't trying to pry," she tried to apologise, "I was just asking. You don't have to say anything if you don't want to. You're not under any obligation to."

Loki tried to read her. He felt he was a good judge of character and could easily tell someone's emotions and their hidden motives– something that went hand-in-hand with his silver tongue. However, all he felt from Mitchie was truthfulness and a deep, honest regret for offending him. He sighed, resisting the urge to rub his temples as he felt an upcoming headache start on.

"Okay," he finally said after a few moments hesitation.

There was an awkward silence in which neither of them quite knew what to say. Mitchie, obviously, broke it. She couldn't handle the silence. "Well, I'll tell you what I'm thankful for," she started, craning her neck up to look him dead on in the eye, "I'm thankful for my home; I'm thankful for my brother and that we're both here; and," she paused to stare at him and whispered softly, "I'm thankful that I met you. I'm thankful that you're my friend."

Loki broke the eye contact straight away. He felt his throat constrict the longer he stared at her, seeing the naked emotion swim around in her brown orbs. It caused an unfamiliar emotion to swell up in him and he couldn't handle it. It was not something he had ever felt before and he felt himself quickly becoming angry with himself for entertaining the emotion for so long.

He forced himself to look down at the ground so he wouldn't get more angry as he stared into Mitchie's open face.

"Anyway," he heard her say though his eyes were still trained on the ground, "I was just asking because today is Thanksgiving and, traditionally, its a day for giving thanks. Oooh, and we have turkey. Yeah, turkey's real nice. I love it." He didn't have to look at her to know that she was rambling. "Although, my brother tends to eat all of it because he's a big fat pig and so there's hardly any left for the rest of us but I don't care. I'm just happy that everyone else is happy."

"How?" Loki found himself asking. His voice was tinted with rawness, chocked up from the emotion that was swallowing him whole. He looked straight into the young girl's eyes. "How can you be happy from everyone else's happiness? Don't you care about your own?" He didn't mean to sound mean or blunt. He was asking.

Instead of her furrowing her brows, Loki was pleasantly surprised by the broad smile that stretched her face. "It's easy to be happy from everyone else. Seeing other people's happiness, knowing that they have no care in the world except by being with you, feels you with a beautiful rush. Of course I care about my own happiness; but I've leant that sometimes you have to think about other people."

Loki stared at her incredulously. Listening to what she was saying, he found it hard to believe that this Midgardian in front of him was only eight (_and a half_) years old. When she spoke, she sounded like someone way above her years. Loki had never met anybody in all of his exceptionally long life quite like Mitchie.

She continued on, "I care about you too. I care about your happiness. Don't you have any body that you put first?"

Loki frowned at her question. _Did _he have anyone that he cared about before him? Thor, maybe, when they were both younger. When they were children. Then they both grew up and Loki found his own talent and he gradually grew apart from his brother. And the added bonus that they weren't even biologically related didn't help matters.

Mitchie seemed to see Loki's internal dilemma and she changed the subject for his sake. "Anyway, Mom came to my room to just tell me that my dinner is ready. I have to go now but I promise I'll bring some up for you so you don't starve," she smirked as she said the same phrase she said every night she had food.

"Go on then," Loki managed a weak smile. "I won't miss you." He didn't miss the way Mitchie rolled her eyes as she bounded down the stairs, leaving Loki alone with his thoughts.

Later that night, when both Mitchie and Loki were curled up in their respective 'beds', Loki whispered to the sleeping form of the little Midgardian, "I'm thankful for you too," as he turned out the lights and shut his eyes.


End file.
